<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>hope the winter goes easy on you by eneiryu</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28635786">hope the winter goes easy on you</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/eneiryu/pseuds/eneiryu'>eneiryu</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Teen Wolf (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>M/M, Post-Series</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 12:00:36</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,652</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28635786</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/eneiryu/pseuds/eneiryu</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“Remind me,” Cyrus requests, “to add <em>your partner isn’t allowed to break into our dorm room</em> to mine and Liam’s roommate agreement.”</p><p>“Sure thing,” Theo mumbles agreeably, and burrows a little more deeply into Liam’s bed.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Liam Dunbar/Theo Raeken</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>59</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>273</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>hope the winter goes easy on you</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This is another one of those stories where I can confidently say that I have no idea what this is, though it's probably as close as I'm as likely to get in writing pure fluff. Also, I have to disclaim credit for the title--I can't remember where I saw it, but it was very cleverly put down by someone else first. Fit too well not to use.</p><p>Originally inspired by <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sandy_at/pseuds/Sandy_at">Sandy_at</a> but this is probably not at all what they were looking for.</p><p>Beta'd by <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/snaeken">snaeken</a> with my thanks.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>To get into UCLA dorms after seven o’clock at night, you have to flash a student ID with the appropriately colored sticker to the supremely bored, underpaid work-study student sitting at a desk just on the inside of the door. It took Theo all of an hour to figure out how to bypass this system, and most of <em>that</em> was spent at a craft store looking for the right shape and color of sticker after he lifted an ID off of a hungover sophomore his first weekend visiting Liam. </p><p>He flashes his stolen ID as he tailgates a gaggle of giggling students through the doorway, and barely even receives a nod in return. The giggling students beeline it for the elevators.</p><p>Theo takes the stairs.</p><p>Liam’s room is on the fourth floor and still requires a key. Last time Theo had been here, Liam had rambled on about how there were plans to switch over to smart locks but the university was piloting that in a <em>different</em> dorm, and in the meantime, who the hell had thought it was a good idea to make the doors <em>automatically lock</em> when they closed? The amount of times Liam had locked himself out on his way to the shared showers, he’d complained, shaking his head.<em> At least the other students had enjoyed the view, huh? </em>Liam had commented next, and elbowed Theo in the side. Theo had rolled his eyes.</p><p>Now, he positions himself in front of Liam’s door and smiles absently at a handful of students who pass by, his fingers working around the thin metal tools he’d slid out of his pocket. The lock gives within a few seconds and Theo turns the knob at the same time that he withdraws his tools, and slips inside.</p><p>He spends a few seconds just standing in the dark of the room, his eyes closed and his nostrils flaring as he breathes deep, and then he pivots to the right and makes his way over to Liam’s bed. It’s still a mess, unsurprisingly, with the covers shoved in a haphazard pile at the end of the bed, and the pillow a wonkily-folded square at the top. So Liam had been late to class again, Theo concludes, but it’s a passing thought, barely more than a blip; Theo is already heeling off his shoes and sliding into the bed as he buries his face in Liam’s pillow. He leaves it there as he reaches down, clumsy and uncoordinated, to grab at the covers until he finally manages to grasp them and pull them up, over his shoulders. He shudders a little as he exhales, settling down more firmly into the mattress.</p><p>He wakes up sometime later to the lights clicking on, and then—a split-second later—someone giving a surprised shriek. </p><p>“Jesus <em>christ,</em> Raeken!” Cyrus complains after, folding over with his hands on his knees. His keys jangle where they’re dangling from the keychain hooked over one of his fingers. “How the hell did you get in here?!”</p><p>Theo had twisted around on reflex at the commotion but had only bothered to squint open one eye. “Picked your lock,” he rasps.</p><p>Cyrus’s expression melts into one of longsuffering. “Remind me,” he requests, “to add <em>your partner isn’t allowed to break into our dorm room</em> to mine and Liam’s roommate agreement.”</p><p>The corners of Theo’s lips quirk up without his say-so. He lays back down. “Sure thing,” he mumbles agreeably, and burrows a little more deeply into Liam’s bed.</p><p>He wakes up a second time a few hours later. He blinks muzzily at the wall a few inches in front of his face, trying to pull his sleep-fogged thoughts together enough to figure out what’d woken him, but then he doesn’t have to.</p><p>“<em>Someone’s</em> been sleeping in my bed,” comes a voice from behind him.</p><p>Theo grins, helpless, and says, “Goldilocks was bears, not wolves.” He’s still looking at the wall as he does so. He turns over to see Liam standing at the edge of the bed.</p><p>Liam waves the criticism away. “Point stands.” His eyes run over Theo’s face. “Why do you smell like blood?”</p><p>Theo just stretches, slow and careful and with his arms rising above his head as far as he can get them before they hit the wall, all the way down to his pointing toes, one of his feet poking out of the bottom of the covers. He relaxes back down with a huff, after, and answers, “It’s nothing,” very softly.</p><p>Liam just <em>looks</em> at him. “Because it’s <em>actually</em> nothing, or because you want to be able to <em>act</em> like it’s nothing?”</p><p>There’s really only one way to win this argument, so Theo kicks off Liam’s covers, and then reaches down to lift up his own shirt, so that Liam can see the unbroken skin of his right side. “Because it’s actually nothing.” He smiles sleepily at Liam, says: “Wasn’t even an alpha, just some jumped-up beta.”</p><p>He goes to let his shirt fall back down, but Liam reaches forward, and molds his palm to Theo’s side before he can. Theo sucks in a sharp breath at the warmth, and pressure. He squirms a little.</p><p>Liam just tightens his grip around the curve of Theo’s ribs, like he could hold Theo still. “I don’t like you getting injured on these track-and-capture missions the Council is sending you on.”</p><p>Theo just layers his hand over Liam’s, and presses down. “Better me than Argent,” he reminds Liam gently, and does Liam the favor of not commenting on the mulish twist that briefly takes over Liam’s mouth. </p><p>But then the corner of Liam’s lips kicks up. “Raeken and Argent, chimera cop and hunter. Seems like it should be a TV show.”</p><p>“Great,” Theo tells him absently. “You write the pilot.” He slides his hand up to Liam’s wrist, and starts tugging. </p><p>Liam follows the pressure immediately.</p><p>He toes off his shoes and climbs up onto the bed, but as he’s moving to knee-walk himself <em>over</em> Theo, Theo’s breath hitches. Liam pauses, and glances down at him. </p><p>He grins, and settles himself down on top of Theo’s thighs instead.</p><p>“Hi,” he murmurs, and cups a hand around the side of Theo’s jaw. Theo turns into it, nosing at Liam’s palm, and then opens his mouth for the press of Liam’s thumb when Liam crooks it against his lips. Liam drags his thumb down, pulling Theo’s bottom lip with it, and then he leans down and kisses him.</p><p>Theo arches up into it, best he can with Liam sitting atop his thighs. </p><p>Still, even when Liam lifts up a little to give him more room to maneuver, Theo doesn’t take advantage, just stays flat on his back. Liam pulls back slightly, a few shallow lines appearing between his brows, and then they smooth out as he <em>grins,</em> amused. </p><p>“Oh, <em>I</em> see,” he grumps, though the smile filters into his voice. “You just want <em>me</em> to do all the work.”</p><p>Theo doesn’t disagree, just closes his eyes and tips his head back, asking without words for the kiss that Liam immediately gives him, his hand still on the side of Theo’s face and his mouth warm, and wet, and the press of it <em>firm</em>. He dips his tongue between Theo’s lips, and tangles it with Theo’s when Theo moans softly and opens up for him.</p><p>He drops his other hand down, to the button and fly of Theo’s jeans.  </p><p>He doesn’t try to drag Theo’s jeans or boxers over his hips, or down his thighs. Instead he just folds Theo’s fly back and then reaches through the slit in Theo’s boxers to pull him out, Theo gasping soundlessly and his heels slipping on Liam’s thin dorm mattress. Liam shushes him, one hand still on Theo’s face and tilting it to the side so that Liam can press his nose behind Theo’s ear, thick rush of air against the skin of Theo’s neck as he breathes deep. His thumb presses in, just under the head of Theo’s dick as he does it, and Theo gives a soft, small cry, pinned underneath Liam’s hands and his mouth. He brings his hands up to curve around and then clutch at the outsides of Liam’s thighs.</p><p>He leaves them there as Liam straightens up, his hand falling away from Theo’s face. It lands on the very bottom of Theo’s shirt and Theo prepares to lift his shoulders, but although Liam <em>does</em> drag the hem of it up, he only does so until it bunches up underneath Theo’s arms. He leaves his thumb hooked in it as he braces his weight down on Theo’s chest, his other hand leaving Theo’s dick—Theo’s breath hitching at the loss—so that he can work at the button, and fly, of his own jeans. </p><p>He pulls his own dick out, and lines it up with Theo’s.</p><p>“<em>Please,</em>” Theo says, even though there’s no universe in which Liam <em>wouldn’t</em> give him what he needs. Liam just takes them both in hand, and starts to rock his hips.</p><p>He comes fast, they both do, Liam’s hooked thumb dragging Theo’s shirt up even a little farther out of the way as both of their releases splash down on Theo’s chest. Theo <em>groans,</em> can’t help it, his head arching back on his neck and his eyes squeezing shut. He’d stopped smelling the traces of blood on himself hours ago but even <em>he</em> can tell that whatever had been left of the scent is gone now, overwhelmed by that of his and Liam’s come. Which had, of course, been the <em>point:</em> Liam’s hand leaves his shirt and drags down his chest, smearing through the mess and rubbing it just the slightest bit into Theo’s skin. Theo huffs a quiet laugh, his eyes slitting open as he relaxes his head back down.</p><p>“You caveperson,” he observes, but fondly. Liam just grins. </p><p>He also refuses to do more than a few cursory swipes of Theo’s chest with a tissue that he leans over and retrieves from his desk, no matter Theo’s halfhearted complaints about how it isn’t <em>Liam</em> who’s going to wake up gross tomorrow. Instead he just tosses the tissue vaguely in the direction of his trash can—it may even make it in—and then pushes and shoves at Theo’s various limbs until he’s manhandled Theo over onto his side, and Liam can mold himself up against Theo’s back. He loops an arm around Theo’s waist, and pulls him in close.</p><p>“Night, Theo,” he whispers, and tugs the covers back up over them both. Theo just hums, his eyes already closed and his muscles already going lax.</p><p>He wakes up <em>after</em> Liam the next morning, which is some kind of miracle. More to the point, based on the fact that he’s alone in Liam’s bed, Liam had clearly somehow managed to climb out of his bed without jostling Theo awake, though Theo <em>does</em> have vague memories of Liam leaning over him and murmuring <em>go back to sleep.</em> Lifting his head, Theo glances around, scents the air, and realizes from the staleness of Liam’s scent that he’s been gone for an hour or so at least.</p><p>The movement pulls at the dried mess on his chest, and Theo makes a face as he glances down.</p><p>Liam hadn’t left him his key, partly because he knows Theo <em>demonstrably</em> doesn’t need one, but mostly because it amuses him, knowing that Theo is now going to have to pick his lock for a second time in twenty-four hours. Theo snorts to himself but then goes to root out Liam’s shower caddy, and the pair of two-dollar sandals he’d found that he wears to and from the floor’s shared bathroom.</p><p>Liam has a pair of Theo’s jeans and a handful of Theo’s shirts stuffed into his chest of drawers; Theo ignores them when he gets back from his shower, and pulls on a pair of Liam’s jeans, tugs one of Liam’s sweatshirts over his head. From the smell of it, Liam <em>clearly</em> hasn’t been doing laundry as often as he should, but Theo doesn’t mind; he finds himself taking deep drags of air in through his nose as he heads out of Liam’s dorm, and starts following Liam’s scent trail across campus.</p><p>He’s at one of the diners on-campus that accepts student dining plan funds, crammed into a booth with Mason and Corey and with half-eaten plates in front of all of them. He’s obviously the first person Theo looks at when he comes through the door, but the <em>second</em> is the LeGrange pack heir; he bows his head respectfully. She quirks her lips, and flicks her wrist to wave him off, the other ninety-nine percent of her attention on her plate of home fries, and the friends she’s sat with.</p><p>“Hey!” Liam greets as Theo slips into the booth next to him. He bumps Theo’s shoulder with his own for no other reason than that it’s there, and he can. “Finally awake, huh?”</p><p>“This last fugitive case really must have run you ragged,” Mason observes, and Theo shrugs, and steals some of Corey’s bacon.</p><p>“I need a menu,” he says, nodding towards the stack of them stored in the table’s condiment stand. </p><p>“No you don’t,” Liam counters. “I already ordered for you. Full breakfast platter, with a side of bacon that you’ll surrender to Corey in reparations.” Theo’s in the middle of eating a <em>second</em> piece of bacon off of Corey’s plate as Liam declares this, so he shrugs again, agreeable, and leans back in the booth seat.</p><p>He lets his eyes go hooded as he listens to the three of them talk. Mason and Liam share a few classes but Corey had started going a different route, which Theo had predicted. <em>It’s civil engineering, isn’t it?</em> Theo had commented to Liam a few months ago, peering over Liam’s shoulder as Liam compared his and Mason’s and Corey’s anticipated schedules for the upcoming semester; they’d sent each other screenshots for exactly this purpose. Liam had demanded how he’d known, and Theo had shrugged. <em>He wants to see things be built up, rather than torn down, </em>he’d answered, and hadn’t looked at Liam when he’d said it because he hadn’t been sure he’d wanted to see the look on Liam’s face.</p><p>His food arrives and Theo immediately, literally forks over his bacon onto Corey’s plate, the tines scraping against the ceramic. Corey shoots him a small grin, there and gone, and goes back to ignoring him, but it’s a benign negligence; it’s why Theo sometimes breaks into <em>Corey’s </em>dorm room, instead of Liam’s, though when he does it’s so he can lounge atop the bean bag chair that Liam had gotten Corey mostly as a joke and sit and read while Corey does the same at his desk.</p><p>Argent calls as they’re leaving the diner—Theo having picked up the tab because he’d <em>been there</em> when Liam’s mom had given Liam the hairy-eyeball about his rapidly diminishing dining plan funds—and so Theo breaks off from the group, and goes to sit in his truck while Argent and Araya Calavera and the other Council members responsible for Code enforcement snipe at each other under the guise of a committee meeting. Theo’s role in this—outlined very firmly by Argent one of the first times they’d been hauled into one of these—is to say absolutely <em>nothing</em> unless directly asked, and so he leans back against the corner of his driver’s seat and door, and tips his head back, eyes closed and arms loosely crossed, as he listens. He gets asked precisely one question, which he answers, and the rest of the time he spends idly imagining the progressively more irritated look on Argent’s face.</p><p>The call wraps, finally, and Theo has already shoved open his door before he hesitates, considering. In the end he pulls it back shut and then slips into the backseat, where he opens one of the back doors a crack instead, and starts quickly stripping himself out of Liam’s borrowed clothes. </p><p>He shifts, and then eels his way out of his truck, rearing up on his hind legs after so that he can set both of his front paws against the door and push it back shut. He drops back down flat after, and starts trotting his way across campus.</p><p>Theo knows exactly where he’s going primarily because Liam told him where he and Mason and Corey would be, but also because he could track Liam struck blind, struck deaf; half-dead. It doesn’t matter that UCLA has a student body of over forty-five thousand students: Theo can pick out Liam’s scent even with the LA pollution tanging the breeze and he follows it, weaving through clumps of students and gaggles of professors. A few people murmur about the <em>big black stray</em> and wonder if they should call animal control, but no one does. Theo makes it to the open grass fields towards one end of campus without issue.</p><p>Liam and Corey are there with a handful of other students, lacrosse sticks in hand as they whoop and holler and crash into, alternatively, each other and the muddy ground; it’d rained last night. Theo can feel the wet squelch of damp earth in between the pads of his paws and that’s one of the reasons why Mason squawks as Theo finishes picking his way over to him; Theo leaves a smear of dark brown mud along the bottom of Mason’s jeans as Theo edges himself right up into Mason’s personal space, and flops down on top of his ratty sneakers. </p><p>“Hey,” Mason complains, but half-heartedly, his toes wiggling underneath Theo’s belly. </p><p>He’d been sitting against a tree at the edge of one of the fields with his knees pulled up towards his chest, an open textbook propped against his thighs and a highlighter in one hand, and after a second he shakes his head with a put-upon sigh, and goes back to what he was doing. Theo would buy his annoyance if Mason’s warming scent wasn’t prickling down his throat; filling his lungs. He huffs out a long, slow breath, and settles more firmly back against Mason’s legs. </p><p>He’s dozing, the exposed part of his belly sun-warm and his body gently rocking every time Mason shifts, when Liam and Corey finally abandon their game, and jog their way over. They’re both sweaty and grime-streaked, and to the humans around they probably smell pretty offensive. To Theo’s nose, though, they just smell <em>full</em> and <em>ripe</em> and <em>alive,</em> and his tail thumps helplessly as Liam goes to his knees by his head, and picks up Theo’s muzzle between his hands as he starts to scratch his fingers through Theo’s fur. </p><p>“Hey, you,” he says, and then he startles and glances up when a handful of shadows appear over his shoulder. Theo squints open an eye—a good portion of his attention distracted by the absent fingers Corey is scritching across his flank—and sees a gaggle of shyly smiling students peering down at him.</p><p>“Your dog’s really handsome,” one offers to Liam, who <em>grins,</em> bright and blinding. The student’s fingers twitch against their biceps where they have their arms loosely folded against their chest. “Could we…?”</p><p>Liam glances down at Theo, who does nothing except give a long, lupine stretch; all of his limbs pointing straight out before he collapses back down flat against Mason’s legs and the ground, his jaw dropping open a little as he pants. Liam takes it for the answer it is, and strokes a thumb across the ridge of bone just over one of Theo’s eyes. </p><p>“Yeah,” he says. “Sure, go ahead.”</p><p>The students all take immediate advantage, kneeling down and reaching forward to scrub their hands across Theo’s sides, his flank. Behind him Corey and Mason are both laughing quietly to themselves and Liam is shaking a little with barely contained snickers; when Theo glances up at him, he mouths <em>teddy bear.</em> Theo just opens his jaw and twists his head around so that he can gnaw harmlessly at Liam’s wrist.</p><p>“Is he really your dog?” Another one of the students asks curiously. </p><p>“Ah, no,” Liam admits, twisting his wrist around so that he can grab the bottom half of Theo’s jaw—his hand still mostly in Theo’s mouth, which he seems blithely unconcerned about—and shake it a little. “Technically he belongs to my friend Scott.”</p><p>He grins down at Theo after he’s said this, sly and secret. Theo releases his hand to nose his muzzle up underneath Liam’s palm instead, encouraging it onto the top of his head. Liam immediately starts to stroke, his damp skin catching and dragging a little against Theo’s fur. </p><p>“But,” Liam continues, his grin becoming a little wider, a little more chromatic and showy, as he switches it to the curious student, “he’s kind of my responsibility, you know?”</p><p>The students all nod sagely, though there’s no way that they can understand what Liam really means. Theo does, though. He closes his eyes and drops his muzzle onto Liam’s thighs, Liam still sat back on his heels by Theo’s head. </p><p>Eventually the curious students take their stroking hands, and themselves, elsewhere. Liam and Mason and Corey devolve into easy, purposeless conversation once they do, Corey sitting cross-legged by Theo’s hindquarters and occasionally running his fingers absently along Theo’s side, gently picking tufts of loose fur free where Theo’s coat is starting to shed with the warming weather. Liam leans back on one palm and uses the other to pet over Theo’s head, scratch at the sensitive skin behind his ears, Theo’s muzzle still laid over his thighs.</p><p>“Ugh, alright,” Liam finally declares, as the sun is starting to get low. “I’ve got that test next week I need to go study for.”</p><p>He stands up—dislodging Theo, who jolts fully awake and then grumbles—and dusts himself off. Corey and Mason have vague date night plans and so they pack up their things as well, the three of them still idly chatting until finally they’re all set to go, Mason’s books and Corey’s equipment packed away. They say their goodbyes—Theo performing his own by leaning into first Corey and then Mason, sending them stumbling sideways a few clumsy steps—and then Liam starts leading the way across campus, his lacrosse stick hooked over his shoulders and one hand dropped in the fur at Theo’s ruff. He nods at anyone who looks at them curious, bright and sharp and a little bit of a dare.</p><p>“You know, one of these days,” Liam comments, when they make it back to Theo’s truck and he’s yanked open the back door to let Theo hop inside, “someone is going to take advantage of you leaving your truck unlocked when you decide to play Lassie, and steal this monster.”</p><p>Theo’s already shifted back and is in the process of pulling Liam’s borrowed clothes back on, but it still takes him a moment to work through speaking through a human jaw again; the muscles feel unused and vaguely unfamiliar, the shape just subtly wrong. Still: “It’s not like we couldn’t find them if they did,” he manages, and jumps back down to land next to Liam after. </p><p>Liam just smirks at him, small and soft-edged if still amused. “I’m sure Argent would <em>love</em> that.”</p><p>Theo shrugs. He kisses Liam, just because he can, and pushes his truck’s back door shut behind himself.</p><p>He locks it.</p><p>It’s not quite late enough when they get back to Liam’s dorm for the underpaid, severely bored work-study student to be in place yet, so Liam is able to swipe them in with his ID without issue. He leads the way up to the fourth floor—slouching back against the elevator wall with along, exaggerated groan—and when they reach his door it takes him a few lazy tries to fit key to lock. Theo stands behind him, not at all impressed.</p><p>Inside, Cyrus is at his desk with his computer monitors lit up, his headphones on. They’re noise-canceling so even Theo can barely hear anything from them until Cyrus lifts them off his ears, and hooks them around his neck. “Hey, Liam. Raeken,” he greets, and then he and Liam start idly catching up. </p><p>Contrary to his request last night, he doesn’t mention his proposed breaking-and-entering ban; Theo smirks, and goes to slide his way onto Liam’s mattress, benignly ignored and benignly ignoring in turn.</p><p>But: “Hey,” Liam says, sometime later, his fingers poking and prodding at Theo’s side. Theo makes a face and tries to blink himself awake as he squirms away from the tickling pressure, but he still feels drowsy and only half-present. “Lazy bones, you’re not getting off that easily. You’ve gotta help me study for this thing.”</p><p>Theo bares his teeth at Liam, blunt and still human-shaped. Liam isn’t impressed; he sticks his fingers in Theo’s mouth instead, Theo jerking backwards with a protesting squawk. Liam <em>cackles,</em> but desists when Theo rolls over onto his back; recognizing that he’s won. He roots through the mess on his crappy university-supplied desk and comes up with a stack of notecards held together with a rubber band. He drops them on Theo’s chest.</p><p>Theo squints down at them, going a little cross-eyed. “Biology?”</p><p>“Biology,” Liam confirms. He drops into his desk chair with a huff, and looks expectantly at Theo.</p><p>Theo starts out using Liam’s flashcards, Liam’s spiky handwriting such that occasionally he has to lean over and demand to know what the hell Liam was trying to say, but after a while he leaves them flat on his chest and just starts asking things from memory. “That’s sodium,” he corrects, when Liam gives the wrong answer for something. His eyes are closed, and his head is lax on his neck, laying flat against the mattress. </p><p>“I thought <em>that</em> was potassium,” Liam complains, in a little bit of a whine. He starts pawing through the flashcards on Theo’s chest. “Yeah, it <em>is.</em>” He says triumphantly. “It says so right here.”</p><p>Theo still hasn’t opened his eyes so he can’t see what Liam’s doing, but from the rush of air in front of his face and the flapping noise he hears, he can guess Liam’s waving one of the cards around. “They’re both necessary for nerve impulses,” he says. “But not in the same way.”</p><p>He’s still drowsy, his body feeling heavy and sunken into the mattress is a way that makes him feel grounded, rather than suffocated. Still, there are far away storm clouds gathering at the corner of his mind, thick and cloying and threatening. He likes that he can use who and what he was to Liam’s benefit but it’s not a clean set of knowledge; it feels like there are consequences to touching it, grime on his mental fingers as he pulls it up, and speaks it aloud so Liam can hear it, can learn from it.</p><p>He startles a little when he feels fingers push up under the sleeve of the shirt he’s wearing, <em>Liam’s</em> shirt, and wrap one by one around his forearm. Theo blinks open his eyes and twists his head sideways to look, and Liam just grins at him, small and close-mouthed. Theo isn’t in pain and there’s nothing else for Liam to siphon but the pull of it is comforting regardless, the storm at the corner of Theo’s mind retreating; the clouds breaking up, the sunlight breaking in.</p><p>“Okay, so what else, encyclo-Theo-pedia,” he says, tugging a little at Theo’s forearm for emphasis. </p><p>Theo smirks back at him, same soft quirked edge of his lips, and twists his wrist around so that he can wrap his own fingers one by one around Liam’s forearm in turn. “Magnesium,” he prompts, and feels his heart beat against Liam’s fingertips; feels Liam’s beat against his.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>All feedback loved! If you liked, please consider a comment or a <a href="https://eneiryu.tumblr.com/post/639776815635922944/hope-the-winter-goes-easy-on-you-eneiryu-teen">reblog</a>!</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>